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Gillian Farnie
01865 227377
Gillian Farnie studied pharmacology at the University of Liverpool (UK) and did her PhD in molecular oncology at the Northern Institute for Cancer Research at the University of Newcastle upon Tyne, UK (2002). She then had 6 years postdoctoral training in breast biology and breast cancer, developing novel 3D culture systems to grow human ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS) and investigating epidermal growth factor and Notch signalling. During collaborations with Dr Rob Clarke she became interested in cancer stem cell (CSC) signalling and was awarded an esteemed 5-year Breast Cancer Now Scientific Fellowship (2008) to start her research group.
Based at the Manchester Cancer Research Centre her research focused on the role of breast CSCs in the resistance to radio and chemotherapy, exploring FAK and Wnt signalling as well as metabolic and epigenetic targets. Aligned with these studies her lab is also developing bespoke hydrogel models of breast progression in collaboration with Dr Cathy Merry and Prof Tony Howell.
Research Areas
The Cell Biology group will innovate and develop assays to validate in-cell efficacy of established and new probe families which include bromodomains, Nudix hydrolases, deaminase and DENN domains. Each assay will be developed to address the unique biology of the target using molecular biology (inc CRISPR, RNAseq, ChIP, Mass Spectrocopy) and confocal microscopy (HTS/HCS). Further detailed investigations into the biological mechanism and disease target will be carried out both in-house and with academic and pharmaceutical industry collaborations. By advancing SGC probes into cellular assays we aim to produce pre-clinical in vitro data to enable the translation of SGC probes into a disease area within the clinic.
Gillian’s research interests include disease heterogeneity, multicellular and 3D disease models.